Featured Is believing/faith a work ?2

Do you believe you are saved by faith? If so, then you too are meriting something.

x merits y

If you have faith ---> then you may be saved.

x merited y ---> Faith merited salvation

 

Christ’s blood just arbitrarily and randomly saved you? God asks nothing of you?

 

Well, from our point of view, it does seem to be arbitrary and random. It's actually according to God's purpose and plan. But for sure there was no system of good works or rituals whether sponsored by a church or not that makes God a debtor to owe us salvation.

As to whether God asks nothing of you? In order to motivate Him to save you? Nothing. But once you are saved you are His and bought with a price. He may ask anything or everything of you.

 

If God saves without any action on your part, then salvation indeed would be entirely arbitrary and random. Your salvation is left to chance and is nothing more than the ultimate game of Powerball.

 

There was a thread on this site fairly recently if I remember right where one of the guys was using the word "arbitrary" like that. I didn't like the term "arbitrary" but he's a nice guy and only meant that there was no reason the he could figure out. You, on the other hand, if you want to compare God exercising His sovereign will as a game of Powerball have at it.

 

You are placing faith before salvation. This is inaccurate.
We are saved by grace (not by merited faith) alone.
Salvation gifts the receiver of this gracious act of God the capacity to have faith to believe.

If faith came before God graciously making us alive with Christ, then you and I could boast of our own personal choice to believe.
God tells us in Ephesians 2 that we have no room for boasting.

 

"For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." - John 3:16

This is Christianity 101...so I thought.

Is belief no longer necessary for salvation?

 

As I mentioned in a previous thread, the example of Cornelius completely destroys and refutes the Reformed's Ordo Salutis.

 

Others have utterly destroyed your contention. Do you have any actual theological teaching to share, or will you fall on the sword of Cornelius?

 

Cornelius: Acts 10 | Monergism

If you are serious I'd take a look at this paper. It might shed some light.

 

That statement is no less true with God's purpose according to election in sight, my friend.
Everyone that does genuinely believe, shall not perish, but have everlasting life.

Belief is necessary, but one's belief does not warrant anything from God.
Rather, belief of the Gospel is yet one more evidence of God's grace being shown to someone.
See Acts of the Apostles 13:48 as one example...the reason why anyone truly believes on Christ is because they are ordained to eternal life.

May He bless you with many good and perfect gifts.

 

Where? Would you mind linking me to this contention being destroyed?

I am going to fall on the sword of Cornelius, the ungenerate pagan who had not heard the Gospel, had not received the Holy Ghost, tried to worship St. Peter, yet sought God, pleased God and was righteous.

Cornelius 1
Reformed's Ordo Salutis 0

 

God conditions salvation upon man choosing to believe. This is Christianity 101...so I thought.

 

Well, first, you are the one who brought up ordo salutis, not me. I simply read the Bible and see God choosing whom He wills.

Acts 10:1-3
In Ceasaria there lived a Roman army officer named Cornelius, who was a captain of the Italian Regiment. He was a devout, God-fearing man, as was everyone in his household. He gave generously to the poor and prayed regularly to God. One afternoon about three o’clock, he had a vision in which he saw an angel of God coming toward him. “Cornelius!” the angel said.

Second, we see that Cornelius was no pagan, nor was his household. He was a proseltyte Jew. He was attempting to honor God by keeping the law. God chose to mercifully call him and establish the New Covenant in him.

So, Cornelius does not support your assertion.

 

Bingo! He seeks God, pleases God and is righteous (Acts 10:22). Yet he is unregenerated, not a believer in Jesus Christ and had not even heard the Gospel.

Cornelius does that which Reformed theology says is impossible.

A proselyte Jew? I guess he missed the first lesson when the Shema was taught.

"And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his feet, and worshipped him. But Peter took him up, saying, 'Stand up; I myself also am a man.'" (Acts 10:25-26)

Jews do not worship men. Cornelius was a pagan Centurion. He tried to worship St. Peter.

 

I once believed that for a very long time.
That was before I saw this:

" Blessed [be] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly [places] in Christ:
4 according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
5 having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,
6 to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
7 in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;
8 wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;
9 having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself:
10 that in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:
11 in whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:
12 that we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.
13 in whom ye also [trusted], after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,
14 which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory." ( Ephesians 1:3-14 ).

...and these:

John 6:22-65.
Romans 8:28-30.
Romans 9:6-24.
2 Thessalonians 2:13-14

I then realized that if God conditions salvation upon us choosing to believe, then that means we have something we can boast in other than His mercy and grace.
It also means that when it comes to being saved, God rewards the person who makes the right choice and penalizes the person who makes the wrong one...
Giving the person who made the correct choice an advantage over the other person.

That's called "merit".

Choosing someone "in Christ" before the foundation of the world completely bypasses man's efforts to merit salvation... and makes it a gift ( Romans 6:23 ), not a reward for performing the correct act.

When all is said and done, salvation is by grace ( Romans 4:4, Romans 11:5-6 ), not works ( Ephesians 2:8-9, Titus 3:4-7 ).
What makes it of grace is His doing all the work and leaving none of it up to us.

We end up believing, because it has been given to us to do so in the behalf of Christ ( Philippians 1:29 ).